Under Her Skin (7 page)

But Kade’s measured response ignored all those things. “I’m supposed to protect the entire community from dangers. I don’t think Lindi is a danger to any of us.”

I did my best to look unthreatening, clasping my hands in my lap and clamping down internally on every serpentine instinct I had, despite the almost overwhelming urge to open up and take the temperature of the room.

Hot, I was guessing.

I could almost imagine the scents of anger and fear.

But imagining was all I would allow myself do.

I didn’t know what this Council Rita had mentioned might do if they discovered a lamia in their midst, but I was fairly certain it wouldn’t be anything good.

There had to be a way to keep the Bryants from sharing what they knew about me.

Because if they did, I was likely to be in big trouble.

I didn’t relax until Johnny Bryant slumped back into a blue recliner, his posture apparently calm—but I could read the tension underneath the lazy pose.

Like a cat watching potential prey.

“Fine,” he said, a wave of his hand encompassing both Kade and me. “Talk.”

“Maybe we should let the kids go play or something,” I ventured, uncomfortable making suggestions, but equally unwilling to let the children hear about the child-murders—particularly Preston, who almost certainly still carried trauma from his kidnapping.

Rita nodded and jerked her chin at the two younger Bryants, who reluctantly stood. When they moved toward the back of the house, Rita stopped them. “Oh, no. You can still hear every word from back there. Go outside. I’ll tell you if you need to know any of this.”

They might have been powerful shifters, but the children still slumped off with typical protests.

All the adults remained silent until the front door shut behind Kirstie and Preston.

I let Kade do most of the talking, too worried about saying something that would set the Bryants off to do much but nod as the mongoose shifter gave a quick explanation of the potential connection between a series of shifter-victims, the hospital, and the CAP-C.

The mention of my employer caused the two adult Bryants to turn steely eyes on me.

“You ever think maybe she’s doing it?” Johnny asked Kade, nodding toward me.

Kade replied without looking in my direction. “I’m certain she’s not. Lindi has alibis for at least two of the times of death. She was with clients. I’m confident the detective in charge of the case will clear her of all the others, as well.”

I had been examining the room, quietly trying to superimpose the image I had developed of Vazquez’s kidnapping of Preston onto this real space, when Kade’s comment pulled my attention back around to him. I hadn’t realized that I had ever been under consideration.

It made sense, of course, that Kade would look into my background and any alibis once he made the connection between the CAP-C and the shifter-children’s deaths.

Didn’t mean I had to like it.

“So why are y’all here?” Rita asked as her husband settled back into the chair.

That
y’all
made me feel better than anything that had happened since I arrived on the Bryants’ doorstep, indicating as it did Rita’s lumping together of me and Kade.

Kade continued his explanation. “Lindi and I have been going through our files together to search for potential victims with connections to both the hospital and the CAP-C. This morning, we found Preston’s files. We’re concerned that Kirstie might be in danger.”

This time, the low, inhuman growl that filled the room came from Rita, not Johnny. Her green eyes glowed, the light reflecting off the cat’s pupil in her otherwise human face.

“The clowder protects its kits,” Johnny said, his tones guttural.

“As do all the other shifter clans.” Kade leaned forward to emphasize the words, despite his mild tone. “We simply want to add to that protection.”

“How?” The single word hissed out around sharpened teeth that flashed when Rita spoke.

“Our best bet is to catch whoever is doing this.” I spoke for the first time since Kade had taken over. “Can you think of anything that might help us with that?”

Johnny snarled, and the temperature of the room rose. Kade placed one hand on my arm. “We understand you might not be able to come up with anything right now,” the mongoose shifter said. “We’ll leave your den now. If you think of anything that might help us, you can call me. Will that work?”

Johnny nodded and Kade rose, pulling me with him.

“Thanks,” Kade said as we moved toward the door. “We appreciate anything you can tell us.”

We shut the door behind us, and I glanced around the yard. I could hear the Bryant children’s voices rising in play from behind the trailer. The two guardian cats were still in place, perfectly motionless except for their heads turning to track me as I moved toward my car.

“I’m sorry,” I began, but Kade cut me off.

“We can discuss it back in your office,” he said curtly.

I wasn’t looking forward to that conversation, but I didn’t say anything else in front of the unknown shifters watching us.

When we returned to the CAP-C, we didn’t get to have the conversation I really wanted—the one where I confirmed that someone really was killing shifter children who had been both Kade’s patients and my clients.

Instead, Scott was waiting when we arrived, seated in a chair in my office, his legs stretched out before him, his booted feet crossed at the ankles, hands clasped behind his head, elbows out. When he saw Kade walk in behind me, Scott’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t move otherwise.

“You two find anything interesting?” he asked.

Kade shook his head. “The Bryants couldn’t think of anything that might help us.”

Now Scott did move, standing in one fluid motion. “You should probably leave the questioning of potential victims to the experts,” he said.

The comment made me snarl, even though I suspected it was directed more at Kade than me. Still, I couldn’t let it go. “I am an expert,” I reminded him. “I’ve questioned dozens of victims and potential victims right beside you. Even more without you around.”

Scott’s slightly belligerent posture relaxed as he turned his attention to me. “You’re right, of course. Sorry about that, Lindi.”

“No problem.” I moved around behind my desk, trying not to let the exchange bother me. I could at least ignore it. “You have something new for us, or are you just here to visit?”

Kade eyed the taller man for a moment, then took one careful step back to stand behind Scott, almost fading into the corner of the room.

His bright eyes flickering around the room suggested he was taking in every nuance of the exchange, though.

“I stopped by to see if you’d turned anything up,” Scott said.

“Not really.” I fell into my usual report cadence, professional and clinical. “No one at the Bryants’ could think of anything odd that has happened—and since their child’s kidnapping, they’ve been pretty hyper-aware. They’re watching even more carefully now, though.”

“Good. Write up a report and send it to me. I’ll let you know if we come up with anything.”

“Thanks.” I worked to keep my tone neutral.

With a nod, Scott rapped two knuckles on my desk. “Okay. We still on for tonight?”

At the investigator’s words, a wave of spicy-scented heat rolled over me from Kade’s corner. Even Scott felt it—his eyes flickered toward the corner and a tiny frown creased his brow, but he didn’t say anything.

“Yes,” I responded, a little too loudly and emphatically. Scott blinked and his eyes darted toward the corner again, but he simply nodded and moved toward the door. He stopped in the doorway, turning so his face was clearly visible to both me and Kade. “Looking forward to it,” he said, and winked at me.

The tiny smile quirking his lips as he left the room was followed by another hot wave of anger.

* * *

I never did get to talk to Kade that afternoon. As Scott was leaving my office, Gloria came in to discuss a child-abuse case, and with a nod to both of us, Kade slipped out.

By the time I got home to my two-bedroom condo, all I wanted to do was collapse on the couch and recover from my day. Dealing with the Bryants’ anger had taken a toll on me, and I could have happily spent the evening watching stupid television shows. Maybe a sitcom marathon, shows with no elements of crime or the supernatural.

I had promised to go out with Scott, though, so after only one half-hour episode, I heaved myself up and went in to take a shower.

The hot water pulled the worst of the strain out of my muscles, and by the time Scott arrived, I was ready, wearing my favorite little black dress and heels.

“You look great.” Scott handed me flowers as I opened the door. It was a sweet, old-fashioned gesture, and I felt like I should probably appreciate it more. All it did was make me anxious about the possibility of ruining what had been, until now, a great working relationship.

After I put the flowers into a makeshift vase—a large mason jar that had once held salsa from my favorite restaurant—we climbed into his truck.

“A movie okay?” Scott asked.

“Sure. What do you want to see?”

He tossed out the name of the latest science fiction blockbuster.

Not likely to include much in the way of either crime or the supernatural. Almost as good as a rom-com.

I was right, too. The movie was nicely distracting and had the added benefit of keeping me from trying to talk shop with Scott, at least until dinner at a new Italian restaurant afterwards. Even then, I managed not to bring up work.

Scott did. “Learn anything interesting from the Bryants today?”

I twirled angel hair pasta around my fork, watching the tendrils wrap around one another as I tried to marshal my thoughts and the lies I would need to tell. “Not really. They’re suspicious of anyone who comes to talk to them. Not Kade, though. He’s treated the whole family before, I think.”

Scott frowned at the mention of the doctor. “You’ve treated the whole family, too.”

“But only after that one traumatic experience. It’s not surprising that they might want to distance themselves from everything and everyone associated with that incident.” I cut a tiny piece of chicken off the cutlet on my plate and added it to the twirled pasta. Popping it in my mouth, I waited to see if Scott had anything to add to his comment.

My mouth was so full that I almost choked when I looked up to see Kade standing behind Scott, glaring at me with eyes that shimmered gold and hot.

I managed to swallow down the food with a gulp of water just as Scott turned to see the doctor behind him.

“What’s going on?” I asked at the same moment that Scott demanded, “What are you doing here?”

Kade’s nod encompassed Scott, but he made eye contact with me when he said, “It’s Kirstie Bryant. She’s been attacked. We need to go to the hospital.”

* * *

The child’s dark lashes threw spiky shadows across her cheeks. When Rita Bryant saw me enter the curtained enclosure in the ER, she stood up and growled, her entire body tensing as she bared slightly elongated and pointed teeth at me.

Scott’s gaze flickered back and forth between us, confused but assessing.

Kade moved to intercept Rita before she got to me, placing gentle fingertips on her upper arms. “Remember, I said I’d deal with this.”

The cat shifter’s stance didn’t change, but she nodded and took a step back.

“What’s going on?” Scott addressed Kade, but his glance included me in the question.

“What happened?” I ignored Scott’s question, focusing on Kade.

“This evening, sometime after we left the Bryants’ home—”

“What time exactly?” Scott interrupted, then shook his head and raised one hand at his own question. “Scratch that. Give us the details first.”

“At some point late this afternoon or early this evening, Kirstie was attacked.”

“Fine. I’ll get the timing details from the cops. What’s wrong with her now, physically?” Drawing a small notepad from his back pocket, Scott began jotting down information.

“She’s been poisoned.” I heard the anguish in Rita’s voice, coming out in a slight burring of her voice—the sound of an animal’s growl underlying her human speech.

“With?” Scott didn’t look up as he continued writing.

“Snake venom.” Kade’s eyes flicked toward me, then away again.

Scott’s hand paused above the paper. “What kind?”

“We’re not entirely certain, though we’ve given her a standard antivenin cocktail.” Now Kade was the one reverting to a professional tone, as if to cover the potential oddities of the conversation.

Narrowing his eyes, Scott dropped his hands to his sides without putting the pen or notepad away. “If you don’t know what kind of snake, how do you know it’s snake venom?”

“There are bite marks on Kirstie’s side.” Kade pointed toward the bed, waving his hand from side to side to take in the tiny figure huddled under the covers.

“Show me,” I said.

Kade glanced at Rita as if for permission. She pursed her lips, but nodded, and the doctor lifted the little girl’s gown up on one side, high enough so I could see the double pair of fang-marks on her side. Whatever it was had struck just above the waistband, an area unprotected by her pants and easily exposed if she lifted her shirt.

I needed to talk to Rita Bryant, to learn more about what, if anything, she had seen, if Kirstie had said anything about her attacker.

I couldn’t ask any of that in front of Scott—not if I wanted to get real answers.

But there was no doubt in my mind it was a lamia.

I had grown up with a herpetologist.

I not only was a snake in my other form, I also knew snakes, inside and out. I knew their fang tip spread, their venom strength, their muscle tone.

This was not a bite from a regular viper. The puncture marks were too far apart. The serpent that had bitten her was at least as big as Suzy, but with a venomous bite—and most snakes Suzy’s size or bigger were constrictors, not vipers.

Except me.

This wasn’t my bite, of course, and I suspected I could prove it—these fangs were farther apart than my own.

Scott stepped in. “Wait. I’m confused. She was snake-bit? What makes you think this is connected to the other attacks?”

Kade pulled back the curtain, and with a jerk of his chin, he indicated the nurses’ station a few feet away. We followed him as Rita sank back into her chair, all of her attention focused once again on her unconscious child.

Kade leaned against the far edge of the counter, as far away from the busy, bustling doctors and nurses as possible. “The mother says she saw ... someone ... leaving the scene.”

“So why did she come at Lindi when we arrived?” Scott asked.

“She thinks that the someone she saw might have been Lindi.”

Something flickered through Scott’s eyes as he glanced at me.

“A woman?” I asked. For some reason this surprised me—probably because statistically, most killers were men.

Then again, Kirstie wasn’t dead.

“What time was this?” Scott was back to jotting in his notebook.

“Around seven o’clock.”

“Then it couldn’t have been Lindi. She was with me.”

The air around us heated with Kade’s anger, but his face remained perfectly expressionless. “She was?”

“We were watching a movie in a theater.” I might have imagined the slight smirk that crossed Scott’s face as he spoke, but I doubted it. “And then we went to dinner. Where you found us.” He paused for a moment, then spoke again. “How did you know where we were, by the way?”

“Lucky guess,” Kade said shortly. “I called Detective Moreland, too. He should be here soon.”

Scott raised one eyebrow at this non-explanation, but Kade and I both ignored him. After a moment, the investigator continued speaking.

“If the mom thought it was Lindi, that gives me at least one small detail to go on.” Scott made a few more notes. “But damn,” he said quietly. “I wouldn’t have expected it to be a woman. These serial things are usually men.”

Exactly what I had thought. But something else had occurred to me in the meantime, and I couldn’t figure out any way to tell Scott that it really might be a man. If I read Kade’s comments and expression correctly, what Rita Bryant had seen wasn’t a person at all, but a snake.

A shifter snake.

And that could mean only one thing.

Somewhere out there were other lamias.

I wasn’t alone.

But my relative, whoever and wherever he might be, really was a monster—the kind who killed little kids for fun.

“Guess I’d better go interview Mrs. Bryant.” Scott’s determined move toward the woman left me standing alone with Kade, my head spinning from the implications of what I’d learned.

“So,” the doctor said. “Dinner and a movie with Scott?”

I blinked at him for a long moment before I finally replied. “Don’t. You know what this might mean. Don’t try to distract me, Kade.”

“You tell me what you think it means.” Kade crossed his arms and leaned back, those golden highlights in his eyes starting to churn as he stared at me. Momentarily distracted, I wondered what other people—non shifter people—thought of his strange, swirling eyes.

I lowered my voice. “It means there might be another lamia.”

He nodded. “Why else do you think I asked you to come here tonight?”

“You mean, after hauling me into a room to maul me the other night? Gee. What else could I possibly think you wanted to discuss?”

Kade ignored my snarky comment. “I think maybe we should let the others know about you.”

“What happened to
if they find out, you’ll have to do your duty and kill me
?”

“The situation has changed.” When Kade glanced up and waved at someone over my shoulder, I realized that we were standing only inches apart, hissing at one another.

No, nothing suspicious about that. Nothing at all.

“We need to have a long conversation, somewhere far away from anyone else involved in this case,” I said, stepping away from him.